Law, Politics & Culturehttp://lawandcourts.com
... but pretty much anything we find interestingWed, 23 Apr 2014 19:11:25 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1Josh Zingher on social group membership and the evolution of political partieshttp://lawandcourts.com/2014/04/24/josh-zingher-on-social-group-membership-and-the-evolution-of-political-parties/
http://lawandcourts.com/2014/04/24/josh-zingher-on-social-group-membership-and-the-evolution-of-political-parties/#commentsWed, 23 Apr 2014 19:11:25 +0000http://lawandcourts.com/?p=2714Continue reading →]]>Josh Zingher has posted his paper “An Analysis of the Changing Social Bases of American Political Parties: 1952-2008″ on SSRN. Josh is is a Doctoral Candidate in Political Science at Binghamton University. His research focuses on several aspects of American politics, including mass political behavior, minority and immigrant politics and Congressional elections. He can be reached at www.joshzingher.com . Here is the abstract for the paper:

In this article I assess how the social bases of the American political parties have evolved over time. To accomplish this task, I first determine which social group memberships significantly influence individual vote choice with a multivariate analysis of ANES data. I then measure how many votes each politically relevant social group contributed to the party coalitions in each presidential election from 1952-2008. I discuss how group contributions have changed over time and establish the demographic and behavioral causes of group contribution change. I find that the party coalitions have been restructured as a result of groups’ changing voting behavior and the changing ratio of groups in the electorate.

Obama hearted “Cards” just a few weeks ago when he took aside Netflix Inc. Chief Executive Officer Reed Hastings at a White House meeting of technology gurus to discuss problems with HealthCare.gov. Obama said he wished he could be “ruthlessly efficient” like Kevin Spacey’s Machiavellian character, Frank Underwood, who is “getting a lot of stuff done.” His skill set includes killing, sleeping with a reporter who prints his every word, and conspiring with his wife to do in the politicians who deprived him of his appointment to be secretary of state.

To what degree does the identity of the majority opinion writer affect a citizen’s level of agreement with a U.S. Supreme Court decision? Using a survey experiment, we manipulate the majority opinion authors of two Supreme Court cases between two randomly populated groups. By investigating ideological incongruence between a case’s policy output and the majority opinion author we are able to empirically test the extent to which individuals are willing to agree with a Court opinion that is authored by an ideologically similar justice even though the decision cuts against their self-identified ideological policy preferences. Our study provides insight on the extent to which policy “buy in” by citizens is affected by policy cues represented by the policy messenger of a political institution. We find that, although individuals generally give deference to the Supreme Court’s decisions, a messenger effect indeed augments the specific level of support a given case receives.

That, too, is a slow process, said Kuhlman. Construction on an incinerator at Deseret Chemical Depot in Utah, which held 45 percent of the nation’s chemical weapons stockpile, started in 1989. Testing began in 1994, and it became operational in 1996, he said. It took two years to destroy a supply of nerve-agent weapons that was similar to the size of Syria’s estimated stockpile. The entire Utah project took 15 years.

]]>http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/23/it-is-hard-to-destroy-nerve-gas/feed/0“The Future of the Book”?http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/20/the-future-of-the-book/
http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/20/the-future-of-the-book/#commentsFri, 20 Sep 2013 10:28:27 +0000http://lawandcourts.com/?p=2687
]]>http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/20/the-future-of-the-book/feed/0“What Jefferson Read, Ike Watched, and Obama Tweeted”http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/18/what-jefferson-read-ike-watched-and-obama-tweeted/
http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/18/what-jefferson-read-ike-watched-and-obama-tweeted/#commentsTue, 17 Sep 2013 22:20:31 +0000http://lawandcourts.com/?p=2685Continue reading →]]>What Jefferson Read, Ike Watched, and Obama Tweeted: 200 Years of Popular Culture in the White House is a new study of popular culture in the White House. The blurb:

From Cicero to Snooki, the cultural influences on our American presidents are powerful and plentiful. Thomas Jefferson famously said “I cannot live without books,” and his library backed up the claim, later becoming the backbone of the new Library of Congress. Jimmy Carter watched hundreds of movies in his White House, while Ronald Reagan starred in a few in his own time. Lincoln was a theater-goer, while Obama kicked back at home to a few episodes of HBO’s “The Wire.”

America is a country built by thinkers on a foundation of ideas. Alongside classic works of philosophy and ethics, however, our presidents have been influenced by the books, movies, TV shows, viral videos, and social media sensations of their day. In What Jefferson Read, Ike Watched, and Obama Tweeted: 200 Years of Popular Culturen in the White House presidential scholar and former White House aide Tevi Troy combines research with witty observation to tell the story of how our presidents have been shaped by popular culture.

Chapter 7 on music and the quest for cool looks especially interesting.

]]>http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/18/what-jefferson-read-ike-watched-and-obama-tweeted/feed/0The five best books on George W. Bush?http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/17/the-five-best-books-on-george-w-bush/
http://lawandcourts.com/2013/09/17/the-five-best-books-on-george-w-bush/#commentsTue, 17 Sep 2013 01:13:30 +0000http://lawandcourts.com/?p=2683Jacob Weisberg says these are the five best books on the George W. Bush presidency: